By Ronni Kahn AO

Right now, as you read these words, millions of Australians are making decisions no one should ever face: Skip a meal or skip medication? Pay the mortgage or buy groceries? Feed themselves or feed their children? In Australia—a country of abundance—3.4 million households are trapped in this brutal daily calculation. 

We are in the midst of a national food security crisis, where every day Australians can no longer afford to put healthy food on their table. Driven by the rising cost of living, stagnant wages, spiralling housing costs and energy bills, so many Australians are sacrificing food just to get by. 

This is no longer an issue affecting the community’s most vulnerable. More than 30% of people seeking food relief have never had to do so before. They are double wage households, people working two jobs and mortgage holders who are unable to make ends meet. Once bills are prioritised there’s simply not enough left for food. 

Every day across the country, OzHarvest delivers more than half a million meals to 1,550 charities that help feed people in need, and it’s not enough. Our charity partners are telling us this is the toughest they’ve ever seen it. With new faces coming through their doors every week, they’re stretched beyond capacity, and they don’t have enough food to keep up. And that’s just the start – 1,200 more charities are now on our waitlist, still waiting for support. 

We have watched as the lines grow outside our free supermarkets in Sydney and Adelaide, knowing that all the food on the shelves will be gone by the end of that day. Within weeks of opening in Adelaide, over 600 customers a week were coming to get food and in Sydney we serve over 2,000 a week.  Our volunteers and drivers on the frontline are having conversations with people who have never asked for help before in their lives. It takes a huge amount of courage to admit that you can’t afford food, let alone do something about it, so the actual reality of how many people are struggling, , is even more frightening. 

This is why the recent budget was disappointing for charities like OzHarvest who can see how dire the current situation is and how many communities are under immense strain. There was no increase in funding for the food relief sector or those on lowest incomes. Whilst money to support food access in remote First Nations communities is very welcome, there is so much more to be done. A funding promise in the budget reply for food charities is a recognition of the ongoing support needed, but it is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to solving the problem.  

The solutions to create much-needed change are in reach. As a charity, sustainable funding is always needed but we absolutely want the problem of food insecurity to be made a national priority and examined holistically, considering all drivers from economic inequality, poverty, unemployment and climate change. Food insecurity does not exist in a vacuum. It is a symptom of many factors that often result from political decisions that continue to widen the divide between those who can weather financial storms, and those who cannot. 

We need stronger food system governance through a Minister for Food to prioritise this issue and ensure it doesn’t slip between the cracks of different departments and portfolios. Critically, we need recognition from our leaders that food insecurity is intrinsically linked to low incomes, and economic inequality. Increasing income support and implementing housing reform are urgently needed, given those on low incomes spend around 70% of their income on rent. This leaves precious little for other bills and essentials, making food a luxury item rather than a necessity. 

These are desperate times. It’s unconscionable to think our frontline charities have a shortfall of 200 million meals each year, yet 7.6M tonnes of food is wasted every year in this country. We have the solution to these interconnected crises, but we need political leadership.  The current system is not just failing, it’s fundamentally broken.

Food insecurity isn’t just about hunger – it’s about dignity, choices, equity and the impossible decisions so many people are forced to face every day just to survive. This national crisis cannot be ignored and needs to be an election priority. This goes beyond politics – this is about people’ s lives.